


When the Curtain's Drawn

by Firefly_Ca



Series: Happy Ending AU [2]
Category: Glee
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, Child Abuse, Gen, Implied or Off-stage Rape/Non-con, Kidnapping, M/M, Physical Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-15
Updated: 2012-12-15
Packaged: 2017-11-21 05:20:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/593898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Firefly_Ca/pseuds/Firefly_Ca
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A one-shot companion piece to <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/587956/chapters/1057087">Looking for a Happy Ending</a>. Kurt tries to deal with Blaine's disappearance. The more he finds out about Blaine's past the harder it is to keep a positive outlook. (Sorry to anyone who's read this before that I'm posting it as new! I recently figured out that a lot of people missed this when it originally went up, so I  thought I wouldn't back-date this one and give more people a chance to see it.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	When the Curtain's Drawn

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks again to [callmerayray](http://callmerayray.livejournal.com/) for letting me me foist this story onto her with no warning so she could beta for me. My betas are the best betas, everyone. It's a fact.
> 
> Also, this story gets its title from the song ["Disappearing One" by Chris Cornell](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVSKlaSNcX4), which is hauntingly beautiful, completes me, etc. Also, it is directly responsible for this one-shot's existence in the first place, since I only decided to write it after I noticed how well it fit Kurt's perspective during Looking for a Happy Ending.

His dad doesn't have to say anything; Kurt can tell he's there, hovering nervously in the doorway. He just shakes his head.  
  
"Son of a bitch," Burt spits, and Kurt winces. Dad only ever gets that gruff tone in his voice when he's trying really hard to tamp down on an emotion, and right now Kurt knows that the emotion is pure, blinding panic. He's feeling it, too.  
  
"It's been almost 40 minutes," he says tightly. "I didn't want to worry about it too much because his dad will probably be yelling at him for not calling but, god, Dad, bad things happen when Blaine gets yelled at. I don't know what to do."  
  
"I'll tell you what we shouldn't have done," Burt snarls. "We shouldn't have given that kid the benefit of the doubt. I get that he needs time to trust our family but under no circumstances should I have let him go back to that creep without adult supervision and a baseball bat. Call him."  
  
It takes Kurt a moment to register the order from the midst of his dad's self-effacement.  
  
"Right now?" He asks uncertainly. "What if it makes his dad angrier? Or what if he hasn't had a chance to recharge his cell?"  
  
"Doesn't matter," Burt says. "Call him now. If he doesn't pick up we're getting into the truck and we're bringing him back tonight. I won't sleep knowing that he's in such a dangerous situation."  
  
"He's been in that situation for a long time, Dad," Kurt points out, softly. "He knows how to look after himself."  
  
"No, he really doesn't," Burt says, gesturing pointedly to Kurt's phone.  
  
When Kurt finally complies he feels his stomach lurch, even as he tries to tell himself he's being melodramatic.  
  
"Straight to voicemail."  
  
"Right," says Burt. "Let's go. Now. You give me directions as we drive. You've been there often enough to manage that?"  
  
"Just once," Kurt says, grabbing his coat and heading after his dad down the stairs, not sure if he feels better or worse when Burt stops long enough to grab a bat from Finn's room. "I dropped him off after school. I know the way."  
  
His heart is hammering in his ribs and he doesn't know if he's being selfish or practical when he catches himself hoping that for his dad's own well-being he doesn't care about Blaine's safety quite as much as Kurt does.  
  
***  
  
Kurt heaves a sigh of relief when the pull up to the front door of Blaine's house. The lights are all on and everything is quiet. They've been overreacting. The obvious lack of crisis will undoubtedly have its drawbacks – it'll be harder to convince Blaine to leave with them if he's not in immediate danger – but Kurt still feels like huge weights have been lifted off his chest when he gets out of the car and takes in the peaceful neighbourhood.   
  
The uneasiness starts to come back when he rings the doorbell and nothing happens. He knocks instead as he tries to swallow back the fear that's returned, crawling up inside him. His dad gently moves him aside with one hand as he tentatively reaches out and tries the door. It's unlocked and swings open easily. They glance at each other, and Kurt's stomach feels like it's doing backflips.  
  
"Blaine?" Burt calls cautiously, before gritting his teeth and adding, "Mr. Brenner? Uh, it's Burt Hummel, Kurt's dad? Is everything alright in there?"  
  
He carefully takes a couple steps in, gesturing at Kurt to stay behind him. Kurt, of course, ignores this. Two steps inside the entryway and Kurt feels his heart clench. The living room is in chaos. There are broken dishes everywhere, like someone's been on a rampage. School books litter the ground, half of one textbook's cover ripped completely off. The hallway mirror is cracked and it almost looks like the wall right next to it is sagging a little, like it's buckled under an unexpected weight being thrown at it. Kurt thinks there might be a small piece of something rust-coloured dried to the sharp corner.  
  
He tears off down the hall to where he guesses the bedrooms are, calling out Blaine's name, ignoring his dad as he calls after him. The other rooms look more like they've been ransacked than destroyed. The bathroom cupboards are all opened, their contents hastily removed. The master bedroom is full of empty, open dresser drawers and a dresser and end table that appear to have had all the contents uniformly swept off the tops, maybe into a bag.  
  
Blaine's room looks like a hurricane has gone through it. The mattress has been flipped and the boxspring pulled off the bed. The pillow is pulled out of the case, the clothes haphazardly strewn across the floor. Kurt can't take two steps without tripping on something. If the rest of the house has been cleared out, Blaine's room looks like it's been searched. Someone who probably wasn't Blaine has torn it apart looking for something, although Kurt couldn't begin to guess what. He hears his dad coming up to stand next to him.  
  
"Come on," he says quietly, tugging at Kurt's arm. "There's no one here. Try not to touch anything, we need to call the police."  
  
Kurt follows him back to the living room, feeling numb. They were too late. They were too late, and Blaine is out there somewhere with his crazy abusive father, probably hurt and thinking he deserves it, if the way he was talking last night is any indicator. He stands quietly next to his father as he calls 911, and he doesn't feel anything at all until he glances around the room one more time and sees Blaine's phone, literally lying in pieces on the ground. His eyes well up and he's shocked to hear himself make a strangled sound that almost sounds like a whimper as the reality of just how very lost Blaine is hits him like a wave.  
  
***  
  
His hands are shaking as he tries to narrow the parameters on the missing kids website. Up until yesterday he had no idea there was such a thing as a database of "missing and exploited children," but up until yesterday he never had a reason to go looking either.   
  
They'd waited at Blaine's house until officers arrived and they told them what they knew. Kurt still felt disconcertingly hollow as he told them what Blaine had said about his father being violent and disinterested in Blaine's life, and his almost sadistic joy in keeping Blaine cut off from everyone around him. He stumbles over so many, "I'm sorries" and "I should have said something sooners" that the officer finally sighs a little bit and says,  
  
"Kid, you aren't the one who made off with him in the middle of the night. If he's been living with this his entire life, he's obviously very good at hiding his problems. You're not the one who should have picked up on this. Social services should have taken him out of the situation a long time ago."  
  
"Foster care really freaks him out," Kurt says, dully. "He says he'd rather stay where he is before going into foster care."  
  
"Let's just work on finding him first, okay?" The officer offers. "We can help him out in a way that will work for everyone after we've found him and made sure he's not in any danger."  
  
The officer sounds grim, but overall pretty optimistic that they'll be able to alert the authorities and find Blaine quickly once they get a little more information on his dad.   
  
"There are definite signs of a struggle," he says, stating the obvious. "We're worried that Blaine might have been hurt when he left, but from the information we have right now, it looks really promising that he left the house on his own two feet. We're pretty sure whatever happened to him, it didn't incapacitate him. That's the best anyone could hope for, given the circumstances."  
  
Given the circumstances, Kurt doesn't feel much better, but he almost manages to sleep that night without any nightmares about Blaine being found dead in a ditch along the highway. And then the officer calls back on Monday not long after Kurt's been reluctantly shipped back to Dalton.  
  
"What do you mean, Tom Brenner doesn't have a son?" Kurt says, sitting down hard on his bed. He didn't think it was possible to feel more at sea than he already he is, but apparently his dad has called up just to prove him wrong.  
  
"The police aren't really sure what's going on," Burt admits. "But they've checked all of Brenner's records. He doesn't have a son, Kurt."  
  
"Of course he has a son," Kurt snaps. "You've met his son. I didn't imagine him out of thin air. He needs our help."  
  
"Yes, he does," Burt says. "Kurt, they think Blaine was lying. They're not sure why Brenner has him, but he's definitely not Brenner's kid."  
  
"That's idiotic," Kurt says, impatiently, waving away Kyle's worried expression as he finally figures out what the conversation is about. "Why would Blaine be staying with someone like Brenner if he wasn't family?"  
  
"Maybe his actual family was worse," Burt says. "The police think he might be a runaway who somehow fell in with Brenner and was coerced into staying."  
  
"What could possibly make him stay there?" Kurt demands, even as a small part of his mind starts to think back to Blaine's voice saying, " _my parents don't want me around_ " and " _Tom wasn't exactly meant to be a parent_."  
  
"Shelter and a place to sleep at night?" Burt says, pulling him back into the present. "Most runaways don't manage to get an education, kid. Maybe just the fact that Brenner was willing to help Blaine out was all it took. I don't know. But I know what the police told me. Whoever Blaine is, he's not Brenner's."  
  
Kurt lies on his bed staring at the dorm room ceiling for over two hours after he hangs up. He misses the Warbler practise completely and he doesn't even care. He has no idea what he should be doing. When Trent is sent to check in on him and make sure he hasn't "drowned in the communal showers," he's the one who finally gives Kurt something productive to do and tells him about the website.  
  
"If he's a runaway, his name is probably listed there. You can search by physical features, too. Maybe you can find more about him."  
  
"How do you know that?" Kurt asks.  
  
Trent shrugs.  
  
"My parents have helped look for a family friend's missing kids before. His crazy ex ran away with them, but their information got put into databases right away."  
  
"It's a good idea," Kurt says. "Thank you."  
  
It  _is_  a good idea. It's also impossible. Now that he's actually on the site, he's forced to realize just how little he knows about Blaine and who he is. He looks up missing males with the first name Francis and the middle name Blaine with no luck, and then just one or the other. It doesn't change the results. He doesn't know when Blaine ran away, or if he even ran away at all, because " _people get to know me and then they don't want me anymore_." Kurt has no idea, but he takes the names out of the search fields and changes the parameters to Caucasian boys who disappeared from Ohio in the last 16 years. Nothing.   
  
He finally gets results when he looks nation-wide but no one looks like Blaine. On a whim he changes the race to "Unknown" but it turns up nothing at all. He starts to feel queasy. Maybe Blaine's with Brenner because his parents really  _didn't_  want him. Kurt wonders if it's possible to give away a child and not get caught by authorities. Maybe Blaine spends all his time dreaming about having the perfect family and thinking about how lucky Kurt is because his own parents were so awful they actually  _gave him away_  when they got tired of the responsibility.  
  
He forces himself to stop thinking about it before he gets too caught up in how horrible the idea is, but it's still upsetting to know that he not only has no idea where Blaine is, he doesn't even know who he  _was_. It seems sort of obvious now that the guy whose identity Blaine wanted to keep secret was Brenner, and if all of this started when Blaine was seven, Brenner must have known Blaine's family for years, regardless of how long they've been pretending to be father and son.   
  
"Hey Kurt?" Comes a cautious voice from behind him, making Kurt jump and startle out of his thoughts. "You know it doesn't mean anything if you can't find him on there, right? The police have more resources than you do. They can get him back."  
  
"Quinn?" He says, turning around to see her there, looking at him with a worried expression, the rest of New Directions trailing behind her. "Shouldn't you guys be, I don't know? Rehearsing for something?"  
  
"We wanted to come see how you're doing," Rachel says in a take-charge tone, pushing her way to the front, vying with Quinn for control of the situation, oblivious as always as to how petty she looks. "And maybe see if there was anything we could do to help?"  
  
"I don't think singing will really solve this," Kurt says flatly, flipping his laptop shut. "And how did you all manage to get into the dorm rooms?"  
  
"I really don't see how that's relevant, " Rachel says, but both Puck and Santana are looking a little shifty, so Kurt begins to draw his own conclusions.  
  
"Look," Finn says, awkwardly, likely because he was literally just speaking to Finn two hours ago and somehow these particular evening plans went unmentioned. "We know how worried you are. We're worried, too. I know it's not the same as it was with you two, but he wasn't just  _your_  friend, you know? We want him found just as much as you do. We want to help."  
  
"We made fliers," Artie says, and Kurt would really like to know how they managed to get Artie up the stairs to his floor since the elevator only works with keycard access. "I'm sure the police can do things that might help more, but what we _can_  do is hit the streets and malls in Lima and ask people if they know anything. One-by-one if that's what it takes. We thought we'd see if you wanted to join us. It's better than sitting alone in your dorm room going crazy, right?"  
  
Kurt smiles at them.  
  
"Thank you," he says, softly, and he means it. His heart still feels like it's taken permanent residence in his throat, and he still doesn't feel like he'll ever sleep again, but his shaking hands feel a little less shaky as he looks up at so many people who are just as worried as he is.  
  
"Do you mind waiting a second, though?" He asks. "I think a few of the guys here might want to join us."  
  
***  
  
By the end of the week it's more than just a couple of high school glee clubs forming haphazard search parties, it's the entire tri-state area. He's out with a few of the Warblers asking people about Blaine Saturday afternoon when he gets three phone calls at almost the exact same time. He picks up the one from Mercedes first.  
  
"Oh thank god," she says, and it sounds like she's been crying. "Kurt, we need you to come down to the park by Sam's right away."  
  
"What's going on," Kurt demands, nervously. "Has someone there seen Blaine?"  
  
Mercedes makes a strangled noise and Kurt thinks he hears Sam in the background, but the voice is so frantic, Kurt isn't quite sure.  
  
"Someone took Sam's brother. They just walked into the park in the middle of the fucking day and they took him!"  
  
Kurt sits down on the curb, ignoring Thad's concerned, questioning expression. It's either that or fall over.  
  
"What?" He asks, faintly.  
  
"Stacy saw him get grabbed, but she's scared out of her mind and hasn't stopped crying," Mercedes babbles. "They finally found some kid who saw it happen from about a block away, but Sam was telling the cops we'd left them alone at the park so we could go house-to-house asking about Blaine and now they want to talk to you and Mr. Hummel. They think two missing kids disappearing in the same week is suspicious."  
  
Kurt would be hyperventilating right now if he could remember how to breathe. He settles for trying his hardest not to cry. It feels like somehow this is entirely his fault. Like if he hadn't let Blaine go home that evening none of this would be happening. There's a commotion on the other end of the line and a new voice is asking,  
  
"Hello, is this Kurt Hummel?"  
  
"Yes," Kurt manages to squeak out, impossibly grateful for David's reassuring hand on his shoulder.  
  
"We have a few questions we'd like to ask you about Blaine's father, Tom Brenner?"  
  
"That's not his dad," Kurt says, the words coming out of him in gasps. David and Thad are whispering to each other in concern. "And I've never even seen him."  
  
"We're aware," says the man, evidently a police officer. "We wanted to ask if you could give us any information Blaine may have told you about him. Any places they used to live, other people he's specifically named as relatives? Anything you can tell us would help a lot, Kurt."  
  
"He didn't like talking about his home life," Kurt muttered. "Listen, you... you have to get Stevie back. If he's with Brenner..."  
  
Kurt trails off, remembering his conversation with Blaine the night of the party.  
  
"Why would he need someone else?" Kurt asks, helplessly, and he hates how small his voice has gotten. "The police told me last week that Blaine was fine, that he walked out of the house on his own. Why would Brenner need another kid to take his place?"  
  
"We're not sure," the officer admits, "but we need to find them as soon as possible. If Brenner took another kid, they're going to try to get off the radar as soon as they can, Kurt. We need to know what you know. Right now you're probably our best chance at finding them again before they disappear completely."  
  
***  
  
He hopes Blaine is alright, that he's not somewhere scared and in pain, or even dying, with no one to help him. He wants Blaine away from Brenner more than he's ever wanted anything his whole life, but even though the thought of a sick or hurt Blaine being kept alive by the person who hurt him makes Kurt feel ill, it's still better than Blaine getting no help at all. He just needs to know that  _someone_  is helping Blaine right now, because right now Kurt is useless. He's never felt so ineffective in his life as he does when he's talking to the police officers, trying to sift through all the information in his mind to find what's relevant.   
  
The problem is he doesn't know what's important for the police to know. Do they need to know that Blaine always talks about Tom like he's known him his entire life, even if he's never told Kurt when or where they started living together? Do they need to look into missing foster kids? Because if his parents gave him away then maybe what Blaine actually means is that they lost parental rights and Blaine somehow got lost in the system. He doesn't know what needs to be said and what is supposition on his part, so he tries to compensate by telling the officers absolutely everything. In the end it leaves him feeling like he's slowing them down more than he's helping. His dad keeps telling him not to think so negatively, that every little bit helps, but the more Kurt talks the more it feels like he's hammering nails into Blaine's coffin and letting Sam's little brother slip further away. Most days he's so exhausted that he privately pins all his hopes on a phone call that he logically knows will never come.   
  
It's not like Blaine is going to be able to magically find his cell number, like it's anywhere that Blaine will ever be able to find it, even if he  _is_  alright, but Kurt can't bring himself to leave his phone off or unattended even for a second. He'd be embarrassed about how impractical he's being if he wasn't feeling so desperate about it. His friends give him pitying looks when they see him start and clutch at his phone to check for messages, like he'll have somehow missed a call with the volume up at full blast as he clutches it in his hands. The only person who doesn't think this is strange or pathetic is Brittany, which is not what Kurt would call comforting. At least, it's not until the day Santana finally sighs and puts her hand on Kurt's to say,  
  
"Look, I know you're worried, but all you're doing right now is getting yourself worked up over nothing. I get why you're so upset, but you've got to look at thinks logically, too. Blaine won't call you."  
  
Kurt is just starting to bristle and get defensive over the inherent truth of her statement when Brittany guilelessly asks,  
  
"Why wouldn't Blaine call Kurt? They call each other all the time."  
  
"What?" Santana doesn't work very hard at hiding her frustration. "No, Britt. Blaine's missing. Remember how we talked about this? That's why we're going around with his picture."  
  
"Well, yeah, I know  _that_ ," Brittany says rolling her eyes good-naturedly. "But all we're doing is killing time, right? I mean it's Blaine. And it's Kurt. Sooner or later they're going to talk to each other. Then they'll hang out and take turns staring at each other like they're hungry and want to start eating raw people. It's what they do."  
  
She pauses uncertainly before halfway clarifying,  
  
"They look at each other, I mean. They don't eat raw people. I don't think. They don't do that, right Santana?"  
  
"Brittany," Kurt snaps. "Blaine is  _gone_ , alright? He's not calling me, and he's not coming back and there's a good chance I'll never see him again, so can you at least stop making fun of us? Please."  
  
"I'm not making fun of anyone," Brittany says, her face falling into that hurt Bambi expression that normally makes Kurt's heart melt. "I'm just telling the truth. You really like him, and he really likes you. And I don't understand why everyone is so upset right now, because anyone who looks at you two can figure out that he won't stay away forever."  
  
"But Brittany," Santana says, in a voice that probably not as patient as she'd like to think it is. "Blaine probably  _can't_ come back. He probably doesn't have a choice right now. He's probably scared and he might be hurt and he doesn't have anyone to help him get back. It's not up to him."  
  
"It doesn't matter," Brittany insists. "He'll be back. I promise."  
  
"Why are you so sure?" Kurt asks, tiredly.  
  
Brittany shrugs.  
  
"He trusts you." She says. "He looks at you like you're doing something really impressive and hard, like inventing pocket bunnies, when you're really just doing something stupid like talking about Barbra Streisand. He smiles when he sees you walk past and whenever he looked upset while you still went to McKinley, you were always the person he went to talk to."  
  
Brittany leans against Santana in a way that looks a hell of a lot more cozy than just platonic, and Kurt absently wonders when and how Artie left the picture.   
  
"It's going to be okay, Kurt," Brittany says earnestly. "Blaine is always going to come find you, no matter what. You don't need to be scared anymore."  
  
She's so warm and self-assured Kurt almost finds himself thinking he could believe her. Which is of course when she adds,  
  
"Also, I've been researching ghost sex, so if he dies before you get another chance to talk, just give his immortal essence directions to my house and I can tell him everything he needs to know so you don't die a virgin."  
  
Santana heaves a long sigh and gently grasps Brittany by the shoulders and she begins to steer them both away. Not for the first time, Kurt wonders why he has the friends that he has.   
  
***  
  
His first instinct is to throw the phone across the room when the ringing starts. It's painfully late, or rather early, and it feels as though he's only just closed his eyes minutes earlier. His sleep has been restless and he's pretty positive most of his dreams were featuring him lying in bed awake, wishing he could calm down enough to rest. He's jittery and disoriented, but finally his heart slows enough for him to be aware of what is happening. This of course causes it to start racing again almost immediately, because there's only one reason someone would be calling at this hour.   
  
The call is coming from the home landline, and Kurt tries to ignore the way his hands shake as he hits the "answer" button. The irrational side of him holds his breath hoping Blaine's voice will be on the other end, that he'll have finally found his way back home, maybe with Stevie with him, if Stevie was even with him all this time at all. The rest of him is coming apart at the seams, positive he'll be talking to his dad in a few seconds, hearing about the bodies a random farmer has found in a ditch.  
  
The reality is neither one of those things.  
  
"Kurt!" Finn's voice is almost frantic, unhinged to such an extent that Kurt can't decide if the cause is relief or devastation.  
  
"Is he dead?" Kurt's voice is quieter than even he was expecting it to be. Finn is quiet for a few moments, obviously unable to hear properly.  
  
"Oh my god, no Kurt," Finn blurts out hurriedly, as soon as he's registered what it is Kurt has asked. Kurt's heart starts to beat again. "No, it's nothing like that, I promise. We don't really... no one knows what's going on right now, but Blaine found our home phone number online and called the house, like, 15 minutes ago."  
  
"Is he okay?" Kurt demands, tears instantly welling up and running down his cheeks, so fast it feels like a reflex.  
  
"I don't know," Finn admits, sounding as nervous as Kurt feels. "Your dad is on his way out to get him and bring him back, I guess. He's already gone, but Kurt, they're across state lines, in West Virginia."  
  
"'They?'" Kurt repeats, faintly.  
  
"Stevie's with him," Finn says. "That's why I'm calling you from the home phone – Mom woke me up a couple minutes ago to call Sam on my cell, so they don't have to wait to hear everything's okay from the police."  
  
"What about  _him_?" Kurt asks, not sure he wants an answer. "The guy who took them? I mean, it  _was_  Brenner, right?"  
  
"I don't think he said," Finn says. "Mom says Blaine called using some random guy's phone. I guess he picked Blaine and Stevie up by the side of the road or something? They were still in the car on the way to the hospital. The police were going to meet them there."  
  
"Are they hurt?" Kurt is throwing on clothes and digging in his bag looking for car keys. "What city are they in? What hospital are they going to? I'm leaving right now."  
  
"Don't you dare, Kurt."  
  
Kurt starts when Carole's voice cuts in.  
  
"You can wait for your dad to call in with an update. I'm not about to put up with two of you driving on the highway in this state."  
  
"Carole, I  _have_  to go," Kurt protests, loudly enough that he wakes Kyle up, who rubs his face and says something that might be, "Okay, but someone needs to hide these strippers before Mom gets home."  
  
"No," Carole says. "The only thing you have to do is keep on honouring your school curfew. I'm not about to let you go traipsing off in the middle of the night without so much as a word to the people we've paid to keep you safe."  
  
"Kyle is awake! He'll tell them where I've gone!" Kurt says, gesticulating wildly to his roommate even though he knows Carole can't see. Which is probably a good thing, since Kyle acknowledges the attention by mumbling about Smurfette gyrating on a stripper pole.  
  
"Kurt," Carole says firmly. "I understand that you're anxious to see him again and prove to yourself that he's okay, I really do. But this isn't about you, it's about him."  
  
"They're taking him to a hospital," Kurt whispers. "He's  _hurt_."  
  
"We don't know that," Carole says. "He said that Stevie was having some problems but he never said anything about himself. Your father will let you know the second he hears anything else, I promise. Right now we need you to sit tight and just wait a little longer, okay? Burt said he sounded very overwhelmed and tired. He was scared and the fewer emotionally overwrought people he has to deal with today the easier it will probably be for him. This is hard for you to hear, but Blaine is going to be walking on a tightrope these next few days, whatever ends up happening. If it turns out he has a family to go to, or if he comes back with Burt, you're going to have to give him a lot of space either way, okay? This is going to be hard for him."  
  
"Did he say what happened?" Kurt asks quietly. "I mean, did... did it happen to him again?"  
  
"I don't know," and Carole sounds pretty tired herself. "Just... try to be patient with him? He's going to need a friend, but you're going to have to take things slow. Before he left, Burt said he was barely holding himself together."  
  
"How do I know I'm helping and not making it worse?" Kurt asks. He feels like he did the day his mother came home after her first round of radiation treatments: relieved but terrified of doing something wrong.  
  
"Just let him know you're there for him."  
  
Kurt is silent for several long moments after he ends the call, ignoring Kyle's finally coherent demands of "What's going on? Who was that? Is your stoner friend okay?"  
  
Finally he settles on pulling his dad's cell from the contacts and texting "give him my cell number and tell him I'll be waiting for him whenever he wants to call."  
  
He hits send, then quickly adds, "Tell him I missed him and I maybe love him and please please call soon because I'm freaking out". He wisely deletes this, not because he thinks his father will actually pass the message on, but because relief-induced euphoric declarations of love are not the kinds of things you want your father to see at the best of times, let alone in the middle of the mess of a situation he's currently stuck in. Instead he types, "Tell him thank you for finding a way to let me know he got away and that he's safe. And tell him thank you for getting away and not being dead. Or dying in a ditch. Or maybe just tell him I was worried and I'm glad he asked for help." It's still plenty embarrassing but he sends it off anyhow, his brain too fried to censor himself any better.  
  
Then he flops onto his back and covers his face with his hands. He feels the tension start radiating out of his body, as the pain and fear that have been building ever since the night of Anthony's party slowly begins to crack. He can visualize the stress dropping away from his body in pieces, like a splintered mirror that's slowly losing a battle to gravity. First he starts shaking and then he finally,  _finally_ , starts to cry in earnest. If he's so far gone that he turns into the tentative hand that eventually rests on his shoulder as Kyle eases himself onto the bed next to him and sobs even louder, neither boy admits it.  
  
***  
  
It takes a little while to pull himself together enough to remember that there are other people invested in finding Blaine and Stevie as well, and that it would be nice not to make Sam be the one responsible for getting the word out. He takes out his phone and is a little surprised to see he's already gotten 20 new text messages, all from members of New Directions, variations on  _"cant reach sam what is happening"_  or  _"just saw where were they how did u find them"_. The cause turns out to be a short mass text from Quinn that just reads:  
  
 _"Found both safe. Sam went with his family to go get him. Mr. Hummel already on his way."_  
  
Of course Quinn would have been finding out at the exact same time as Kurt. He vaguely remembers something about her mother insisting the Evanses stay at the Fabray house to get away from the painful chaos of the motel after Stevie went missing. Now that his head is clearing of its perpetual state of panicked emotion, he's a little surprised at how detached he feels from any actual  _events_  that have taken place in the past couple weeks.  
  
He sends a modified version of Quinn's text to the Warblers to let them know what's happened, and then a second text to both glee clubs asking them to avoid contacting him for at least the next day so he can keep his phone free. He supposes he could still text, but chooses to pretend it's not an option. Already his nerves are jangling around inside of him. Until he talks to Blaine even the thought of communicating with someone else is unbearable. Not that this stops a steady stream of concerned Warblers (and eventually teachers after Carole calls to explain Kurt's inevitable absence from the day's classes) knocking on his door.   
  
Surprisingly, Kyle does an excellent job of keeping any of them from getting inside the dorm, all business and, "I'm sorry I can't let you in right now, but I'll be sure to pass on any messages" to the visitors, and gleeful, "I always wanted to be a bouncer" to Kurt as soon as the door is closed. His simplicity is soothing in its own way. Kurt thinks maybe he'll request him again as a roommate in the fall. Even though he  _does_  exist entirely on Doritos and makes mashups of Nickelback and Avril Lavigne songs in his spare time.  
  
He's especially thankful to have the room quiet when his dad  _finally_  starts calling with updates on what's been happening.  
  
"I...uh, I don't think I should be telling you  _everything_ , but it sounds like things were pretty grim for both Blaine and Stevie for a while until late last night when Blaine managed to break them out of the house they'd been locked up in."  
  
"Brenner did stuff to Stevie, too?" Kurt asks, feeling sick.  
  
"I wouldn't want to say one way or the other, but Stevie's with his parents now talking to an officer, and Mr. Evans just came out to talk to Sam. They both look upset."  
  
"But they're both okay?" Kurt prompts. "How does Blaine look?"  
  
"Haven't seen him yet," Burt admits. "No one will tell me anything because I'm not family, but from what I've overheard, he may have some broken bones."  
  
"Oh god," Kurt says, wondering how it's possible to feel  _worse_  than he did an hour ago, even though he knows no one's dead and Brenner's arrest is all over the early morning news.  
  
"Calm down," Burt orders. "He's upright, he's talking, and he's going to be  _fine_. I won't leave here until I'm sure everything's going to be okay."  
  
"Is he going to come home with you?" Kurt demands.  
  
There's a long pause before Burt says,  
  
"I don't think they've found his parents yet, so I'm not sure what's going to happen. If he needs a place to go to, we will provide that place for him, I promise you. But you've got to be ready to accept that he might have a family who wants him back, and he may end up with them."  
  
"He sure didn't seem to think that they wanted him," Kurt says a little darkly, because he still isn't sure what to make of Blaine's real family at this point.  
  
"He also was paranoid enough to think living with a pedophile was safer for him than talking to an adult about what was happening. No offense, Kurt, but I'm not inclined to trust his judgement at the moment. The kid obviously has a survival instinct, but it's the screwiest one I've ever seen."  
  
"That's what I keep worrying about," Kurt says. "I mean, someone had to teach him that survival instinct, right? How can they be good parents if they made Blaine think he deserved to be abused?"  
  
Again there's a long pause as his dad obviously tries very hard not to agree with Kurt, but the silence says everything he's fighting to keep inside anyhow.  
  
"I'll call you back once I've seen him," Burt finally says. "It might still be a while."  
  
***  
  
He only gets one more call from his dad after, coming in between the dozens of news reports he reads that morning as he tries to sort out what happened, letting him know Blaine won't be coming back to Lima. That Blaine has had a family who wants him all this time, who has been looking since he was seven years old. Ever since the abuse started.  _Ever since someone stole him_ , Kurt's mind supplies, the pieces coming together, even if he still can't wrap his head around what it must be like to be kept apart from the people who love you for so long that you've been lost longer than you've been safe.  
  
Blaine has parents who love him and want him now, just like he wanted, and he's going to go live with them in Westerville. Westerville, because the whole time Blaine's been suffering in Lima, his family has been looking for him one town over. Kurt knows he should be happy that things are turning out this way, but all he can think is,  _what if I don't want him to go?_  And,  _what if there was something I didn't do that would have helped them find him sooner?_  
  
"I'll make sure he has your number," Burt promises again. "His family is coming for him, but I won't let them leave before he has a way to reach you."  
  
Kurt thanks him, faintly, but he can't help but wonder if it's pointless, if Blaine's new life is going to take up all of his focus now, and if maybe that's the best thing that could happen. After all, what else would Kurt be at this point but a reminder of all the terrible things Blaine's been through since his entire life was stolen away from him? He's ready to do whatever Blaine needs him to do to make everything easier, but the thought that what Blaine might need is to forget him makes Kurt's stomach hurt.  
  
For now, he sits with his cell phone in his hand and he waits. He's not entirely sure what for. A sign, maybe, or an invitation. Something that will tell him what to do.  
  
He has no idea if minutes or hours have passed before the phone in his hand rings again. The number isn't his father's and the area code isn't local. Kurt still doesn't know what he should do, but so far as signs and invitations go, they don't get any clearer than this. Out of his depth or not, he's not about to become yet another face in the crowd that disappears as soon as things get scary.  
  
The phone barely has a chance to ring before he's answering.  
  
"Blaine?"


End file.
